NAME
sort - sort lines of text files
SYNOPSIS
sort [OPTION]... [FILE]...
sort [OPTION]... files0-from=F
DESCRIPTION
Write sorted concatenation of all FILE(s) to standard output.
Mandatory arguments to long options are mandatory for short options
too. Ordering options:
-b, ignore-leading-blanks
ignore leading blanks
-d, dictionary-order
consider only blanks and alphanumeric characters
-f, ignore-case
fold lower case to upper case characters
-g, general-numeric-sort
compare according to general numerical value
-i, ignore-nonprinting
consider only printable characters
-M, month-sort
compare (unknown) < 'JAN' < ... < 'DEC'
-h, human-numeric-sort
compare human readable numbers (e.g., 2K 1G)
-n, numeric-sort
compare according to string numerical value
-R, random-sort
sort by random hash of keys
random-source=FILE
get random bytes from FILE
-r, reverse
reverse the result of comparisons
sort=WORD
sort according to WORD: general-numeric -g, human-numeric -h,
month -M, numeric -n, random -R, version -V
-V, version-sort
natural sort of (version) numbers within text
Other options:
batch-size=NMERGE
merge at most NMERGE inputs at once; for more use temp files
-c, check, check=diagnose-first
check for sorted input; do not sort
-C, check=quiet, check=silent
like -c, but do not report first bad line
compress-program=PROG
compress temporaries with PROG; decompress them with PROG -d
debug
annotate the part of the line used to sort, and warn about ques‐
tionable usage to stderr
files0-from=F
read input from the files specified by NUL-terminated names in
file F; If F is - then read names from standard input
-k, key=KEYDEF
sort via a key; KEYDEF gives location and type
-m, merge
merge already sorted files; do not sort
-o, output=FILE
write result to FILE instead of standard output
-s, stable
stabilize sort by disabling last-resort comparison
-S, buffer-size=SIZE
use SIZE for main memory buffer
-t, field-separator=SEP
use SEP instead of non-blank to blank transition
-T, temporary-directory=DIR
use DIR for temporaries, not $TMPDIR or /tmp; multiple options
specify multiple directories
parallel=N
change the number of sorts run concurrently to N
-u, unique
with -c, check for strict ordering; without -c, output only the
first of an equal run
-z, zero-terminated
end lines with 0 byte, not newline
help display this help and exit
version
output version information and exit
KEYDEF is F[.C][OPTS][,F[.C][OPTS]] for start and stop position, where
F is a field number and C a character position in the field; both are
origin 1, and the stop position defaults to the line's end. If neither
-t nor -b is in effect, characters in a field are counted from the
beginning of the preceding whitespace. OPTS is one or more single-let‐
ter ordering options [bdfgiMhnRrV], which override global ordering
options for that key. If no key is given, use the entire line as the
key.
SIZE may be followed by the following multiplicative suffixes: % 1% of
memory, b 1, K 1024 (default), and so on for M, G, T, P, E, Z, Y.
With no FILE, or when FILE is -, read standard input.
*** WARNING *** The locale specified by the environment affects sort
order. Set LCALL=C to get the traditional sort order that uses native
byte values.
GNU coreutils online help:
Report sort translation bugs to
AUTHOR
Written by Mike Haertel and Paul Eggert.
COPYRIGHT
Copyright © 2013 Free Software Foundation, Inc. License GPLv3+: GNU
GPL version 3 or later .
This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.
There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.
SEE ALSO
uniq(1)
The full documentation for sort is maintained as a Texinfo manual. If
the info and sort programs are properly installed at your site, the
command
info coreutils 'sort invocation'
should give you access to the complete manual.
GNU coreutils 8.22 October 2018 SORT(1)